NEW DELHI: A 28-year-old man was arrested from Noida, Uttar Pradesh, for allegedly blackmailing a minor girl after obtaining her obscene pictures through a phishing link on social media, police said on Monday.
The accused, identified as Sumit Kumar, is a repeat cyber-offender and was earlier booked under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act in 2020. He was granted bail in February 2021 but was later declared a proclaimed offender in March 2024 after failing to appear in court.
According to police, the complainant reported that his daughter received a message on social media from a hacked ID of her former tutor. The sender falsely claimed that her nude photos were available online and sent a phishing link that prompted her to enter her social media credentials.
Once she logged in, the accused hacked her account and coerced her into sharing obscene images under threat and deception. He also blackmailed her by sending morphed images and threatened to circulate them unless money was paid, a senior police officer said.
Following a coordinated operation, Kumar was arrested on Monday from a wine shop in Noida. Police said he had previously been arrested in Malviya Nagar for a similar modus operandi—hacking social media accounts of women, impersonating them, and extorting money by threatening to share their morphed photos.
During interrogation, Kumar revealed that after jumping bail in 2021, he fled to his native village in Bihar and later took up a job as a housekeeping supervisor at an IT firm in Noida, believing he would not be traced. He admitted to committing such crimes to make easy money, police said. Police added that efforts are underway to determine whether he was involved in other similar offences.
